


Hope and Clay

by tabulaxrasa



Category: Supernatural
Genre: BAMF Castiel (Supernatural), BAMF Dean Winchester, Crowley is really just a cameo, Dean is Really Smart, Ghosts, Happy ending if you don't pay attention to the rest of the season, M/M, Original Female Characters - Freeform, Sam Ships It, Semi-established relationship, Sexual Tension, WOC characters, Winchester family hunting trip, casefic, haunted museum, post 12x12 "Stuck in the Middle with You", relationship status angst, spncasefic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-15
Updated: 2017-06-15
Packaged: 2018-11-12 20:03:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11169084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tabulaxrasa/pseuds/tabulaxrasa
Summary: The museum is haunted, the security guard is dead, the ghost has an alibi, and Dean is… worried about his relationship status with Cas (currently: It’s Complicated).A Winchester family hunting trip threatens to go awry from the weight of too many secrets– and an unstoppable killer from the dawn of time.(Set after 12x12, Stuck in the Middle with You)





	Hope and Clay

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you SO MUCH to horrorfemme for all the amazing art work. I am in awe. Remember to tell her how awesome her work is!
> 
> Thank you also to the mods for running this challenge!
> 
> Title bastardized from Led Zepp's "Hots on for Nowhere". Frank the ghost borrowed from the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History.

"When did it get so late?" Marion muttered to herself, trying to tuck her books and papers and research notes into some kind of order before she finally went home.

She'd meant to leave the museum at 6; it was after 9 now. Even her stomach berated her as it rumbled loudly. "Yeah, yeah, my bad," she said. "Also, I really gotta stop talking to myself, Jesus."

She stuffed her iPad into her purse and hit the lights, closing but not locking the library door. The night watchman would get it. The museum's upper floor was a twisting maze of corridors created by crates and shelving units and file cabinets, and it was dark except for a few spotlights and dead quiet. She must be the last researcher here. 

Marion decided a pit stop at the bathroom before getting on the road was the better part of valor. She frowned at her reflection as she washed her hands in the sink. Her skin looked a little sallow instead of its usual smooth light brown, and her hair, natural and held off her face by a bright yellow band, looked a little flat. 

She heard her momma's voice telling her she worked too much, but it was two months until she defended her dissertation. Two months, and then she could sleep… until she found a postdoc position somewhere. 

Someone touched her butt. 

Marion jumped, almost smacking her head into the mirror. She looked over her shoulder, reflexively, but of course there wasn't anyone there.

"Goddammit, Frank!" she snapped. "I'm on my way home!"

The silence felt judgmental. "Yeah, yeah," she grumbled, shaking the water off her hands. "I'm going. Right now. No call for that nonsense. It's fucking 2017, now, you know."

Marion grabbed her bag and went for the door, shivering as she just now felt how cold it was— very cold, so cold she was suddenly watching her breath float up in front of her face.

It had been unseasonably warm out all week, and she was only wearing a light jacket. Marion pulled it closed, and reached for the door again. It wouldn't open.

"What the—?" she pulled again twice, hard jerks, and then tried pushing. The door wouldn't move. Had the night guy come by and locked it? Without checking if anyone was inside? With the light still on?

"Hello?" she shouted, and pounded on the door. "Hey, anyone out there!?"

Something pushed her away. Not hard, she only stumbled back a step— but it had absolutely felt like a hand on her shoulder.

"Frank?" she said, her voice much less confident than before. "Frank, you cut this out right now. I said I was going home."

Then the screaming started. It came from downstairs, the actual museum, and it almost didn't sound human, it was so high and so piercing and full of so much pain. Almost, but she thought there was an attempt at words in there. The sound drove into her like a knife cleaving through her sternum.

Marion stumbled back on her own, all her hair standing on end, more terrified than she could ever remember being. That _sound._ She ducked into the furthest stall, instinctively trying to hide. She closed the toilet lid and sat on it, pulling her feet up. The screaming stopped.

Marion got a hold of herself then, and fumbled her phone out of her purse. Please let it have a charge, please… 15%. Good enough. She dialed 911. It rang, and rang. Marion watched the door of the stall close, watched the lock click over softly. "Stay here, Frank," she whispered. "Please stay." She was shaking, and the line just kept ringing.

"911,"— Marion jumped— "what is the nature of your emergency?"

"I'm at the Wayne County Museum," she whispered. "And I think someone's been murdered."

\---

\---

_Kelly Kline definitely was here, but is gone now._

Dean typed _**When can u come home?**_ but winced and deleted the whole thing. _Way to sound completely needy, Winchester,_ he griped to himself. 

_**What's your next move?**_ No, that was almost as bad, just in the opposite way.

"Shit," Dean muttered. It didn't used to be this hard to text Cas. Dean made a face at himself, because that was a lie. Finally he typed _**Heading back here now?**_ and hit send before he could second-guess himself any more.

Except he'd actually sent _**Heading back here mow?**_ So he had to send _**NOW**_ after it, because you never knew if Cas was going to understand it was a typo or think it was some weird human thing he was expected to do. Trust Cas to show up with a lawn mower or something.

Cas responded: _No. The man at the bus station said she boarded a bus to Twin Falls. I will follow and check out the area._

Dean sighed as his heart sank and then cursed himself and checked to make sure Sam hadn't appeared to hear that. Cas was doing the responsible, adult thing, and Dean was sulking about it like a thirteen year old who couldn't bear to be parted from his…uh, his best friend… for more than a couple hours.

His phone went off again and Dean picked it up to see Cas had sent a row of the grass/wheat emojis, because he was a true Winchester and that meant he was a sarcastic asshole.

"Screw you, buddy," Dean said, aware he was grinning at the phone but unable to stop. Dean was slowly getting used to the idea that he might not be cool anymore. He'd been so cool when he was younger he'd used it all up, he comforted himself, and now all that was left was a dude who wanted to sit at home on the weekends with his brother and his best friend who he might be dating now and watch Netflix (brother optional, to be honest), and talk to his mom, and Dean had actually delivered the "Do as I say, not as I do" speech to a teenage girl and he really should have realized at that point that his cool days were over.

Dean was also starting to overthink his response again, so he compromised by sending the grumpiest-looking face he could find and followed it with _**Be careful**_

_Of course, Dean. You as well._

Dean let the phone fall on the bed this time. He wasn't in any danger, except maybe of pining so much Sam would notice and try to make him talk about feelings. 

Dean rubbed his eyes with the heels of his palms, and tried not to remember the feel of Cas's hands when they'd cupped his face before they'd kissed, how it felt to have his thumbs scrape against the stubble on Dean's face as Cas had sucked on his lower lip. Dean had fallen back, dragging Cas with him, and the jolt that had gone through him when he'd finally, finally, _finally_ felt Cas pressing him into the mattress… Dean's hands had been shaking, fisting in Cas's still-bloody shirt… 

Dean shook his head, tried to shake it off, but it wasn't that easy. In fact, heh, it was already _hard._

Was it okay to jerk off to your best friend if he'd actually jerked you off?

Fuck, Dean had no idea what he was doing here.

\- - -

\---

"Dean!" Sam shouted from the library, even though Dean was in the kitchen, glaring at a pie crust recipe. Dean didn't bother to respond, and sure enough Sam came in a few seconds later. "Dean! Why don't you ever answer? So, get this—" Dean mouthed the words along with Sam, but before he turned around to face Sam— "Mom just called. She thinks she's got a thing up near Detroit."

"An Our-Kind-of-Thing, I'm guessing?"

"Yeah. Sounds like a ghost, but it's in a museum. She needs help figuring out which object to destroy."

"Aww, crap." Dean hated museum ghosts. Too much shit to go through, too many breakable cases and objects and stuff you got in trouble for breaking. Also, too many civilians around. "Has it killed anyone yet?"

"Yeah, a security guard about a week and a half ago. And it sounds, uh, pretty bad. Like, mom sounded kind of weirded out by it, to be honest."

Dean frowned. "But she's sure it's a ghost?"

Sam shrugged. "EMF spikes all over the place. I think that's all she's been able to get to so far though."

"All right," Dean said. "Let's get packed. And let's bring a whole buncha crap. Try and cover our bases."

Sam nodded. "Sounds good. And do you wanna…I mean, should we…?"

Dean raised his eyebrows, trying to get Sam to get to freaking point already.

"Call Cas?" Sam finally muttered. 

Whatever that was about. Dean's first impulse was _Yes,_ of course, _Yes, call Cas, make him meet us, be with me, not alone, safe…_ But if it was just some annoying-ass salt and burn… Dean sighed. "No, better not. Not yet. He has an actual lead on Kelly."

"Seriously?" Now it was Sam's turn to work the eyebrows. "Did he see her? What—"

Dean held up a hand to stem the flow of nerd questions. "Someone had info she was heading to Twin Falls, Idaho, so he's gotta check it out."

Sam nodded. "Yeah, definitely. We got this, anyway."

"Yeah, 'course. Three Winchesters on the case? Ghosts don't stand a chance."

\- - -

\---

Mary was waiting for them at a motel in a suburb of Detroit. They hadn't seen her since the shit show at Ramiel's house— she'd still had Cas's blood in her hair when she'd driven away.

"Hey mom, you doing okay?" Sam went in for a hug. 

"Fine, sweetie. You boys?"

She looked at Dean specifically as she said that, but he avoided eye contact. "Yeah, we're all good mom. What have we got?"

He tried not to notice that her face fell a little bit, and busied himself with heading for the rickety table in her room and looking at the case notes. The room itself was a Winchester special, tacky and outdated, but at least it was Motown-themed, better than some places they'd stayed at. 

Mary had collected the usual hunter clutter of newspaper articles, photocopies of official records, and a brochure of the museum with notes written on the floorplan.

When he looked up, Mary and Sam were staring at him. "What?" he said, too aggressively. 

"Ok," Mary muttered. "Right to work it is."

Why was everything in his life awkward right now? Then again, considering the rest of his life, he should probably be really grateful that his biggest problem was that things were awkward. 

"So there's a ghost?" Dean prompted. 

"I guess?" Mary shrugged. "The building's definitely haunted, but… I've never seen a ghost kill like this. I've never seen _anything_ kill like this."

She pulled out a police file where it had been buried under a pile of photocopies. "Timothy Quinto, the museum's night security guard. No enemies, I already spoke to his family. Here's the police report. I didn't… I didn't want to look at it too much, to be honest."

Dean and Sam exchanged a look. Dean held out his hand for the file. Mary hesitated, then gave herself a little shake. "I know you're adults," she muttered, "but I still… nevermind." She handed him the folder. Dean tried to look at Sam again, but he was looking at their mom, frowning in concern. Obviously any necessary coddling was Sam's job, so Dean opened the file.

It took him a little bit to figure out what he was looking at, and when he did he recoiled. It reminded him, with all the vividness of a PTSD-fueled flashback, that he'd seen a view like this in Hell. Under his knife. He'd _caused_ a view like this.

It had been a long-ass time since Hell had forced itself into his thoughts like this. Dean took a deep breath, held it, looked up away from the glossy red photos in his hands. _Focus on what's real now,_ he told himself.

 _"I would give anything not to have you do this,"_ Cas had said.

 _"You're forgiven,"_ Sam had said. _"Just— forgive yourself."_

 _"Your singing is torture enough,"_ Crowley had said, because even when Dean was a Knight of Hell Crowley hadn't wanted Dean to do— that.

"Dean?" Dean looked at Sam, and at their mom, standing next to him in this shitty motel room. Dean had been out of Hell almost as long as he'd been torturing in it.

"Are you all right?" Mary asked.

Dean flashed them a smile, knowing they'd know it was fake. "Something pulled this guy's hyoid down to his kidneys."

"The hyoid isn't anywhere near the kidneys," Sam frowned.

"I know." Dean passed him the file, watched as Sam went through his own stages of confusion and revulsion.

"Was his jaw cut off?" Sam asked, turning the photo in effort to get it to make sense.

"Ripped off," Mary said. Both Dean and Sam winced.

"His gallbladder was in his throat," Mary added, as she put her back to the file of photos and wandered over to nervously rearrange her notes.

"Something fed it to him," Dean said. Sam and Mary stared at him. "What?"

"What makes you—?" 

"It's not a vital organ and it's in his throat," Dean interrupted Sam, and shrugged. It seemed obvious to him, and he didn't want to talk about why.

If Cas had been there, this was the point he would say something weird, distract the others' attention from Dean. Instead, there was just a long, uncomfortable silence.

"Ok, so… demon?" Sam said. "There aren't that many other things that enjoy torture this much."

"Yeah, just humans," Dean muttered. He already wanted a drink. 

"Uh, so you said there was a lot of EMF?" Sam pressed on.

"Yes," Mary sounded relieved. She grabbed the map off the table and passed it to Sam. "I've marked all my EMF hits on here. Most of them were on the top floor, though, which is staff only and not on this map." She dug for a journal, passed an open page to Dean. "I drew a floorplan and marked it here."

Sam looked impressed, and Dean definitely was as well. "Nice work, mom."

She smirked. "Guess I haven't completely lost my touch, huh? Boys, you ready to get rolling?"

"Yeah," Sam said. "We'll put on the suits."

\- - -

\---

Drivers in Michigan were fucking terrible, but at least they had some respect for Baby. Dean glared at anyone who got too close as he followed Mary's directions. 

The museum was an old mansion, Victorian-era or thereabouts, the sort of local area museum Sam and Dean often ended up in to do research or destroy something keeping a ghost on earth.

The interior didn't seem too packed, from what Dean could see. The entrance hallway was large and two floors high, had the worst fucking wallpaper Dean had ever seen, and had a big wooden staircase taking up most of the back wall. Mary led them straight to an office in the back, under the stairs.

The director was a woman in a gold headscarf and ruby red cats eye glasses. She looked around Dean's age, and she got to her feet when Mary knocked on the open door. 

"Agent Sumner, good to see you again. This is the back up you mentioned?"

"Yes. Agent Copeland and Agent Summers, this is Dr. Amina Aulaqi, the museum director." Dean and Sam obligingly flashed their badges.

"Please call me Amina. I'm glad to see the FBI is taking this seriously," she said. 

"I assure you ma'am," Sam jumped in, "we're taking this very seriously."

"I've asked the student who was here that night, Marion Burress, to come in to speak with you," Amina said. "But she definitely didn't see anything, I'll warn you now."

"That's all right," Mary smiled. "Anything she can tell us would be helpful."

"Do you need me to show you around the collection?" 

"No thanks, Doc," Dean said. "We'll just wander around."

She nodded. "Let me know if you have any questions. I'll be here." She didn't sound terribly enthusiastic about the last part, and Dean didn't blame her. Nothing like sitting outside a grisly murder scene all day to reduce your enthusiasm for the office. Probably.

They left her office and Dean slipped his EMF meter out of his pocket. Waving it around, he got faint traces but nothing conclusive. Not what you'd expect after something eviscerated a guy. There were still stains on the floor where bodily fluids had seeped between the floorboards.

Dean looked at Sam and looked pointedly at the floor. Sam tried to ignore him and hide behind their mom, but Dean glared harder. "Look for ectoplasm." Sam pouted and pulled on some gloves. 

Dean smirked and glanced at Mary, who raised an eyebrow but was hiding a smile. They left Sam to his disgusting task and headed upstairs. Dean's EMF meter pinged several times up there, lighting up in a couple of the rooms.

"I gotta say," Dean said, staring at a collection of pretty cool looking spears that were taller than Sam, "this isn't the kind of local history museum I was expecting."

"It's the collections of a couple of really wealthy industrialists, robber barons maybe, mashed up together," Mary said. "Amina explained it yesterday. One of them travelled all over— Africa, Asia, the Arctic Circle— and there's a lot of stuff he collected. The other one just… bought things, I guess."

"Great," Dean groaned. "So we could be looking at anything, from anywhere, is that what you're saying?"

"Aren't we lucky?" Mary smiled, and Dean wondered if he'd learned that sarcastic expression from her.

"And this building— one of their houses?"

Mary nodded. "It belonged to an Edward Smith uh, Greenhill. Not the explorer one. The other one. John West-something…" she dug out her notebook, flipped through it. "John Westfeld Bower. He was the traveler."

Dean shrugged. Neither name meant anything to him. "And you've looked at reports of deaths in the house already, right? Find anything?"

"A maid died in mysterious circumstances in 1911— whatever that means, but I can guess— and both Greenhill and his wife died in the house."

Dean sighed. "So lots of suspects. Better and better."

"I don't know," Mary said. "The Greenhills both went peacefully. The maid is definitely our strongest suspect."

Dean nodded in agreement, distracted by a bunch of neck rings from Africa. They did not look like fun to wear, damn. 

The EMF meter went off again in a back stairway marked "STAFF ONLY". Dean and Mary exchanged a look and unhooked the chain blocking it off. The EMF just lit up more and more as they climbed the stairs.

"Now we're getting somewhere," Mary said, just as Dean opened his mouth to say the same thing. He smiled, feeling the excitement of the hunt building.

Upstairs looked like the end scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Crates and boxes were everywhere. Dean squinted in disgust at the top of a nearby box. "Doesn't anyone dust up here?"

"Dusting's boring," Mary said absent-mindedly, peering around. "Do you have a flashlight?"

Dean showed her how to use the flashlight on her phone. They wandered around a bit, getting strong EMF hits. "Something up here's really active. We should—" _get the weapons from the car_ , he was about to say, when the slide of metal on metal cut him off.

He turned and saw Mary holding a wrought iron pole, maybe part of a fence. "Want one, Dean? There's a bunch back here."

"Uh, sure. Thanks mom." She passed him the pole she was holding and took another for herself. 

"I'll text Sam, tell him what we're up to," she added.

Dean nodded and carried on down the hallway. "Try the women's room up there," Mary said.

Just holding the EMF meter at the door lit it almost all the way up. Dean, impressed, turned to look at Mary, who nodded. Dean hesitated about pushing the door open. "Want me to make sure it's clear?" Mary was definitely laughing at him.

Dean grumbled and pushed the door open. It was just weird to be in the women's restroom, which was dingy and yellow, even if the only woman in here was his mom. Which… actually made it weirder. Awesome. 

The EMF meter went crazy. Dean shut it off and tucked it in a pocket— it had served its purpose for the moment, and he needed a better grip on the iron pole. He watched the breath cloud in front of his mouth, and saw Mary's doing the same. They moved together in the center of the room, back to back. 

All the doors in the stalls slammed shut at once.

"Yeah, come out and say that to my face!" Dean shouted.

The ghost materialized, right on cue, and it was definitely not a maid. He was an old man, but judging from the uniform he wasn't the owner of the house, either. "Who—" Dean started to say, but the ghost lunged for him.

It was an easy swing for Dean, the iron pole sliding straight through the ghost's middle, and he evaporated in a loud puff.

One of the faucets suddenly flew off the wall. It didn't hit Dean, or even come near him, but the jet of water it unleashed sure as fuck did. It hit him right in the face, in fact.

"Hey!" Mary shouted and pulled him out of the way. "Let's get out of here!"

It was even stranger to be back in the hallway, which looked just the same, except now Dean was soaking wet and starting to get really cold. "What the hell—"

"Dean, are you…okay?" Mary put her hand over her mouth.

"Are you laughing at me?" Dean asked flatly.

"Oh, sweetie…of course…not…" Mary was really struggling. 

Dean wiped the water off his face and shook his hand off. "I'm going down to the car," he said. "I'm getting a towel and a goddamn shotgun."

Mary, tiny squeaks coming out of her mouth as she tried to swallow her laughter, followed Dean down the stairs.

Sam was downstairs chatting up a very pretty girl and apparently not checking his fucking phone, and his face when he saw Dean didn't make Dean inclined to forgive him. The girl just gaped.

"What happened?" Sam asked.

"The ghost in the women's bathroom broke a faucet at me," Dean said.

"Wow," Sam said.

"What?" the girl said. She turned toward the director's office. "Dr. Aulaqi! Frank broke the bathroom!"

"Frank?" Dean said.

Amina ran down the hall. "What happened?"

"You probably want to shut the water off," Mary said.

Dean heard a click and saw Sam with his phone out.

_"Sam."_

Amina ran off, to do something about the water presumably, but Dean had bigger problems.

"Delete that picture, Sam."

"What picture?" Sam hid his phone behind his back.

"Do not send that to anyone!" Dean said.

"Who?" Sam said, all faux innocence. "Like… Cas? Or Crowley?"

"SAM." Dean was in his face and ready to fight him for the phone.

"Don't worry, I didn't send it to Cas." Sam smiled, backing away. "I sent it to Claire."

"Nair," Dean whispered. "This means Nair, Sammy."

Sam looked appropriately nervous.

"BOYS," Mary had her hands on her hips, and Dean couldn't help the flinch. Neither could Sam, at least. "Dean, go out and dry off. Sam, answer your damn phone on a job."

"Yes mo-ma'am," they muttered. "Sorry."

"Wow, you're like their queen," the girl said. 

Dean heard Mary calmly answer "Yes I am," as he stomped out the door. His phone buzzed when he walked out to his car. When he checked it was just 20 crying laughing emojis from Claire. 

Sam was going to have so, so many regrets when Dean got retribution.

Dean left his suit jacket in the Impala and pulled on a spare flannel. He looked kind of dumb in his dress pants and white button down and flannel, even after taking off his tie, but at least Cas wasn't here to critique his style, since apparently that was a thing Cas did now. Like Dean hadn't had to tie his tie for him twenty times before Cas could do it on his own.

Dean grabbed a couple of shotguns and as many salt rounds as he could carry and stomped back into the museum. Back inside, Mary and Sam were facing off with the two locals.

"What on earth are those for?" Amina's eyes went wide behind her glasses. "You're not firing those inside!"

"It's rock salt," Sam said, after a quick glance towards Dean. "We need it to get rid of the ghost."

"But that's what I'm saying," the girl Sam had been trying to flirt with earlier said. "Frank's not the bad guy here."

"He's a ghost," Mary said. "And he attacked us. That's what they do."

"Well, he attacked you because… because _he—_ " she pointed at Dean— "shouldn't have been in the women's restroom!"

"Hey now," Dean said.

"I know this seems bizarre," Amina said, "but…we know Frank."

"You _knew_ him," Dean corrected.

"No, you don't understand!" The girl folded her arms and glared at all of them. "I won't let you hurt him. Frank saved my life!"

\- - -

\---

The girl was Marion Burress, the closest thing there was to a witness to the murder. A living witness, anyway.

"So who is Frank?" Sam asked. Amina and Marion exchanged a look.

"He's the resident ghost," Amina said. "He's always been here. Well. He's been here longer than me, anyway. This house became a museum in the 1930s, and Frank— the story goes— was a security guard here. He died on the job one night and just never left. He's particularly known for haunting the women's restroom on the third floor."

"Sounds like a perv," Dean said.

Everyone else gave him a look. Dean shrugged. "Am I wrong?"

"I mean…he's inappropriate, yeah," Marion said. "But I always just chalked that up to being from the 1930s or whatever, you know?"

"Inappropriate how?" Mary asked.

"If you're here late at night by yourself, and you're a woman, he sort of encourages you to go home," Amina said. 

"By patting your ass," Marion chimed in.

"He means well, I suppose," Amina sighed. "He's just…bad at expressing it in an appropriate way."

"Okay," Sam said. "Marion, what did you mean when you said he saved your life?"

"I was about to go home," Marion said, "and he locked me in the bathroom. I was— yeah, I was scared. He'd never done anything like that before. Then I heard the screaming." She described Frank locking her in, staying with her while she called 911. Going downstairs when the sirens arrived.

"I almost didn't come back here today," Marion finished, with a shudder. "I practically lived here and now…" Amina put a hand on her shoulder. 

The Winchesters drew away and exchanged long looks. "I don't trust this Frank ghost," Mary said, "but…"

"He has an alibi," Sam nodded.

"Ghosts with alibis, great," Dean sighed. He still wanted to gank the ghost, but maybe that had more to do with him getting Dean soaking wet than any danger he presented. Ghosts always turned dangerous in the end, though. Even Bobby.

"It could be a different ghost," Mary offered, but without enthusiasm. 

"So… are you really the FBI?" Amina asked. She didn't sound like she'd accept "yes" as an answer. "Like the actual X-Files?"

Marion went "Ooh!" and looked at them with wide eyes.

The Winchesters exchanged another look.

"You do realize," Marion drawled flatly, "that we're a Muslim and a black woman. We're gonna like you better if you're not police."

Dean snorted. He was starting to like her.

"Okay, yeah," Sam said, turning on the bashfulness, "we're not the FBI. But we are professionals at this."

"At hunting ghosts?" Amina asked.

"At hunting everything," Dean said.

They told the civilians to stay downstairs, passed out the weapons, and the three Winchesters went back upstairs. Dean had left the EMF meter in the car but they already knew there was a ghost. The ghost himself didn't appear again, even after Dean went back in the women's restroom. There was no ectoplasm, no conclusive cold spots, and definitely no sign of any other ghost.

"Well hell," Dean said, when the three of them met back up at the top of the main stairs, on the second floor, since they'd left Sam there. 

"I think he's worn out," Mary said. "Let's get out of here for the day, do some research."

Sam's face fell when they went back down and found out Marion had already left. That the was the only thing cheering Dean up in the face of an afternoon of research.

\- - -

\---

"I mean, we could try burning the bones of everyone who died in the house," Sam said, glaring at his computer screen.

Dean, who definitely hadn't stopped researching two hours ago and definitely wasn't just having an emoji fight with Claire, looked up from his phone. "Great. Digging up three graves is my favorite way to spend a fun family evening."

Sam bitchfaced at him and was clearly about to start on some bitchy rant when Mary spoke up. "I don't think there's any point assuming there's another ghost when we don't even think the MO sounds like a ghost. We should spend some time trying to figure out what it could be. You said maybe a demon, right?" Mary looked doubtfully at Sam's laptop. "We could look for signs of demonic activity."

Sam and Dean exchanged a glance. "Or we could call Crowley," Sam said.

Mary frowned. "Would he tell you?"

Dean and Sam both shrugged. "I think he probably would, yeah. This whole kind of thing isn't really his style," Dean said.

"His style," Mary repeated faintly.

"Give him a call, Dean," Sam said.

"Why do I have to call? It's your turn."

"He likes you better."

"So wha— no he doesn't."

"Rock paper scissors?" Sam offered.

\- - -

\---

"Stupid Sam," Dean muttered. He punched 666 on his screen angrily, although it didn't really do much on a smartphone. He listened to it ring, and ring, and was just cursing Crowley for being too lazy to answer when he suddenly picked up.

"What is it now, Squirrel?"

"You have any demons active around Detroit? Or hellhounds?" 

"Well hello to you too, fine, thank you for asking Dean. Nothing much, just the usual."

"You started it," Dean growled. "Now come on, demons, hellhounds…your mother?"

"I have no idea where Mother is right now, nor do I want to, but I assume she's back to seducing old rich men for their money. Beneath her skills, really, but it keeps her entertained. As for demons and hellhounds, nothing there on my business. But," Crowley loosed a long, put-upon sigh, "there are rather more demons than I'd like running around without my orders right now."

"Yeah, sucks," Dean said, as sarcastically as possible, which was pretty damn sarcastic. 

"Why are you bothering me with this?"

"Some guy got eviscerated. Like… fed his own gallbladder eviscerated."

"Errgh. That's almost enough to put me off my scotch." He took a noisy sip. "It does sound like it might be a demon, but I suppose you know your business."

"Yeah, we do. We'll gank one if we find it."

"Please do."

Dean hung up and looked at Sam. "So I guess that's a no," Sam said.

\- - -

\---

Dean stepped outside to call Cas, looking for some privacy. It had gotten fucking freezing when the sun went down, and Dean zipped up his jacket, but it didn't help much. He wandered across the parking lot and settled himself in Baby. It wasn't really warmer inside the car but at least she cut the wind. Plus, Baby just _felt_ warmer.

He pulled out his phone and opened the address book to Cas. He debated between texting or calling, then muttered "Fuck it," and dialed. It rang four times and Dean was starting to wonder what he was going to do when it went to voicemail when Cas picked up. 

"Hello, Dean."

He sounded pleased, and a little of the tension Dean had been carrying slipped away. "Hey, buddy," he said. "How's it going?"

"Fruitless," Cas growled. "I gained access to the security camera footage at the Twin Falls bus station, but couldn't find Kelly Kline. I'm afraid she may have gotten off the bus before Twin Falls, or not come this way at all."

"That sucks, man," Dean said. 

"Yes," Cas sighed. "But you and Sam— you're with Mary now?"

Dean told him about the case and Cas hummed thoughtfully. "There are things that enjoy slaughter on that level, but they're all fairly obvious, and not good at hiding their traces."

"Yeah," Dean sighed. "A creature of some kind seems more likely than a curse, though."

"I agree," Cas said. "It may still be worthwhile to consider cursed objects, though." If Dean closed his eyes, he could almost imagine Cas was in the car with him. "There doesn't seem to be any reason for me to stay here further. I'm not going to find Kelly Kline here."

Cas just wanted a reason. Dean could give him that. "We could definitely use your help if you wanted to come over here," he said. 

"Really?"

"Always," Dean answered.

When he got out of Baby he saw his mom talking on the phone. She'd wandered over to the vending machines, but didn't seem to be getting anything. Mary looked angry, or at least annoyed, and hung up quickly when she saw him walking towards her.

"Who was that?"

"A hunter in the area," she said. "I was asking about demon signs."

They headed back to the room together. "Oh yeah?" Dean asked. "Anything?"

"Nothing he noticed," Mary shrugged. "But he said he'd keep an eye out."

"Huh, cool." Dean wondered, not for the first time, what it would have been like growing up with Mary instead of John. She was certainly a more social hunter, not just teaming up with Bobby or Bill Harvelle when he had to, and making everyone hate him in the process. 

It would've been a lot less lonely, and Dean felt the familiar pulse of injustice and loss, and pushed it down as usual. Nothing to be done about it now. 

\- - -

\---

The next morning Dean found himself compulsively checking his phone, anxious for Cas to get there. Dean wasn't sure why, that was just going to be some fresh stress, figuring out how to interact with Cas now. What did Cas expect? Why was Dean so unable to handle this?

Yeah, Dean knew why he couldn't handle this, why he was terrified, why his hands had been shaking.

They still had all day before Cas could be expected to arrive, so they went to the library and looked up the grave locations of the Greenhills, their maid, and the security guard, whose name turned out to be Frank Gardner. They were in three different cemeteries, so that would kill some time.

For good measure, Sam found the grave location of John Westfeld Bower, the well-traveled robber baron, but it turned out to be in New York.

The Greenhills had a shared marker. "Oh good, we'll just have to dig one really big hole," Dean said.

The maid's grave was much harder to find, and it was starting to get dark by the time they found it. She just had a plaque, and it was pretty worn. Dean felt bad for her.

Frank's grave was easier to find, but it was also in full view of a busy highway. "What the hell kind of cemetery is this?" Dean complained.

"The highway will be quiet at 3 am, won't it?" Mary asked. "We can come back then."

Sam looked kind of reluctant, and not because it would interrupt his beauty sleep.

"Sam?" Dean prodded.

"If he did save her life…"

_"Sam."_

"Not all ghosts are bad," Sam said, with Significant Eyebrows.

"They go bad eventually," Dean said, his jaw clenched.

Sam slumped, and Dean knew he was thinking of Bobby, too. "Mom didn't," he muttered.

"Excuse me?" Mary said. So then they had to tell her about being a ghost, which she had no memory of. 

By the time they finished the story they were back at the motel, and Dean was back to compulsively checking his phone. Sam went out to get food, and Mary was quiet. She was probably disturbed about having been a ghost, and Dean didn't know what else to say to her about it. 

When Sam got back they sat around and picked at their dinners. "So are we going back to salt and burn Frank tonight?" Dean asked. 

"You said I protected the house," Mary broke in. "When I was a ghost. And I didn't turn evil. So maybe… maybe if you have a purpose…"

"Maybe we can interrogate him," Sam said.

"Interrogate the ghost with an alibi?" 

"Why not? He obviously knew it— whatever this is— was there. Maybe he knows what it is."

Dean shrugged. They'd done weirder shit, after all. "Sure, worth a shot."

"Think we can get in there now?" Sam asked. "It sounds like it needs to be late at night."

Mary nodded. "I think we could get someone to let us in."

There was a knock on the door, and Dean's heart kicked into double time. "I'll get it," he mumbled with his mouth full, and jumped up. He definitely did not look at Sam or Mary.

When Dean checked the peephole Cas was staring at it from the other side, looking tired and earnest and basically like a huge dork. This was the first time he'd seen Cas since he left with minimal explanation the morning after. Dean did not let himself hesitate or think much before opening the door. "Hey, Cas."

"Hello, Dean."

Cas's eyes dilated as Dean looked at him. Dean was so busy trying to read something off him he may have been standing there a bit long because Mary called "Dean, let Castiel come in!"

Sam snorted very loudly, and he was lucky Dean was too preoccupied to punch him. Dean avoided meeting anyone's eyes as stepped back and let Cas in. He took his time shutting and securing the door as Cas greeted Sam and Mary. 

All three of them caught Cas up. "Are we going to interrogate the ghost now?" he asked, and coming from him it sounded perfectly reasonable. Mary made some calls and ten minutes later they were all in the Impala, heading out.

"Family hunting trip," Dean muttered.

"You love it," Sam smiled. 

\- - -

\---

Dean's gaze kept drifting to Cas in the rearview mirror, which to be honest was pretty normal for him. Cas was answering Mary's questions, but he kept his eyes focused on Dean's reflection, so Dean kept meeting Cas's eyes and then having to look away while his stomach squirmed and the back of his neck heated.

The museum looked dark, but Amina was sitting in her car in front when they pulled up. "Are you sure you want to do this?" she asked.

"The sooner we get this taken care of, the better," Dean said, in his Reassuring Voice.

"If you just leave the key with us," Mary said, "we'll lock up. It's better if you're not here."

Amina sighed, but handed over the key. "Please be careful. Whatever this thing is…it's not something to take lightly."

"We've got lots of practice at this, really," Sam said.

"We brought more back up," Dean grinned and indicated Cas.

"Yes, I see…Nice to meet you?" She didn't seem impressed. 

"Nice to meet you," Cas replied politely.

"I promise, he's scarier than he looks," Mary smiled. 

It was cold as fuck outside so Dean was relieved to wave Amina off and head inside. It wasn't much warmer inside but at least it was above freezing. 

Cas froze as soon as they stepped inside. "What is it?" Dean whispered.

"Bad," Cas frowned. They hadn't turned the lights on yet but Dean could still see Cas's eyes darting around. "It's… I don't know what it is. But it's dark, and it's old, and it's…" He looked at Dean, distress clear. "The only thing it comes close to is the Mark of Cain."

"Well," Dean said, voice strained after a moment of charged silence, "that's some great news."

"When you say it's close to the Mark…" Sam began, but Cas shook his head.

"It's not connected, I don't think, but it's … it's not a demon, or any of the creatures you typically encounter. But it's at least that old."

"Well, this is gonna be fun," Dean sighed. "All right, let's get moving." They all headed upstairs, weapons at the ready. "If this ghost mostly likes women, mom, you better head into the bathroom. I guess we'll wait outside?" He frowned. He didn't like sending his mom in alone, competent hunter though she was.

"I can go with Mary," Cas said.

"This ghost really isn't big on guys, Cas," Dean said.

"I don't count," Cas said, and Dean knew that tone so he shrugged. 

"Once we make contact with the ghost you boys can probably come in," Mary said. "Just give us a few minutes first."

Sam, of course, started poking around and geeking out as soon as they got up to the top floor. "See," Dean teased him. "Look how much nerd time you missed out on yesterday. That's what you get for trying to flirt with pretty girls."

Sam looked like he was having trouble deciding where to start. And then he went underhanded. "You seem happier," he said.

"What?"

"As of, like, half an hour ago."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Dean turned away to lean against the bathroom door, trying to hear what was going on inside.

\- - -

\---

What was going on inside was Mary checking out the bathroom, checking all the stalls while Cas stood awkwardly and tried to stay out of the way. "Is everything okay?" Mary asked.

"Apparently?"

"I mean, did you and Dean have a fight again?"

"No," Cas said carefully. "Not that I'm aware of."

Mary laughed. "Sam just said Dean's been…a little crankier than normal."

"Dean often does that," Cas said seriously, and Mary laughed again.

"Sense anything yet?" she asked. "That's something you can do, right?"

"Yes," Cas said. "And yes, there's definitely a ghost nearby." 

"Frank?" Mary called. "We just want to talk to you. We— _I —_ need your help."

Her breath became visible in front of her face and then Cas suddenly tensed next to her. Mary turned around and saw the ghost flickering in the corner. He certainly looked harmless— old enough to be retired, shorter than her.

"Frank? Frank Gardner, right?"

The ghost nodded. Then he looked at Castiel, and he looked puzzled. "I'm Mary, and this is Castiel," she said. "You can trust him, he's an angel."

"It's all right, Frank," Castiel said. "If you want to pass on, we can assist you."

"I've got a job here," he said. "It's important."

"We heard," Mary said. "You keep an eye on the women who work here, right?"

Frank looked anxious. "I just want them to be safe. When they're here so late at night all alone it's dangerous."

"What's dangerous?" Mary asked.

"Well, they could be attacked on the way home, couldn't they! All sorts out there."

Mary and Cas exchanged a look.

"Frank," Mary took a careful step forward. "Marion told us that you saved her the other night, protected her."

The ghost flickered like he'd been hit with iron. "What is it, Frank? Can you tell us?"

He struggled to stay corporeal long enough to shake his head. "It's…the worst thing. The worst. It must be from Hell."

"Has it ever attacked anyone here before?" Mary continued.

Frank shook his head. "It wasn't…it was alone." He was staticky, breaking up.

"Frank, please calm down," Castiel said.

"It can't hurt you…can it?" she half-asked the question to Castiel.

Frank nodded. "It can hurt anything," he said. "Maybe even that." He pointed to Castiel.

"Do you know where it is now?" Cas asked.

Frank shook his head. "Sleeping," he whispered. "But there. So close. So strong. It'll wake again. Soon. Please go."

"Where is it sleeping?" Mary asked urgently. "Frank? We're trying to stop it. Where does it stay, is there something it's connected to?"

Frank vanished. Mary sighed.

"He's still there," Cas said. "I can see him." He looked sorry. "But he can't help us anymore. Frank," he raised his voice, stepped toward the corner. "Do you want to go to Heaven now?"

Frank materialized, just barely enough for Mary to see him. "I'll go to Heaven?"

Castiel nodded. 

"You'll take care of it? The monster?"

"We will," Castiel affirmed. "It is what we do."

Frank nodded. Castiel stepped forward, and reached out his hand. There was a burst of light so bright Mary had to shut her eyes, and when she opened them again the bathroom felt emptier.

"He's gone?"

"He is." But then Castiel frowned. "Mary— do you think it's odd that Dean and Sam haven't come in yet?"

Mary's eyes widened. "Son of a bitch."

\- - -

\---

Dean and Sam had only been standing in the hallway for a couple of minutes before a large, ominous clunk sounded down to the right. They looked at each other.

"So, that's a trap," Sam said.

"Yep," Dean said. They pulled their guns and made sure Sam's demon-killing knife and Dean's angel blade were loose and at the ready. Dean glanced back at the bathroom where Cas and Mary were, but they were probably safer in there than out here. 

They moved silently down the hall. It was dark and there were weird shapes everywhere, but nothing moved, and there wasn't any other noise. The hallways didn't follow the layout of the mansion; they seemed to be created entirely of storage crates and shelves. Dean and Sam reached the back wall without finding anything.

"What the hell?" Sam turned to Dean and frowned.

Dean froze. "Unless it wanted to get us away from the bathroom."

"Shit," Sam agreed and they raced back. As they turned the corner there was a flash of bright light behind the bathroom door.

Dean knew that light. "Cas!" he shouted. The door opened just as Dean reached it and he slammed into Cas and Mary. Dean and Mary both fell down. Sam manage to halt before tumbling over them. Cas, of course, kept his feet.

"Ow," Dean and Mary both groaned. 

"Dean, Sam," Cas said, relieved. "You seem to be all right."

"Yeah, we're fine," Sam said. "Well…" he looked down at Dean, who was having some trouble after slamming at full speed into an angel wall.

"I'm sorry, Dean," Cas pulled Dean and then Mary to their feet. "Are you all right?"

Before Dean could open his mouth Cas already had a couple of fingers pressed to Dean's head. "I'm fine, man," he said, although he was secretly grateful his ass and back immediately stopped hurting.

"Why were you running?" Mary asked.

"We saw the light," Dean said. 

"I sent Frank on to Heaven," Cas said.

"Was he helpful?" Sam asked.

Cas and Mary exchanged a look.

"Yes and no," Cas said. Dean suddenly realized Cas was still standing basically on top of him, crowded in next to him a little more than the hallway's narrowness called for. "But let's get out of this building first. It's…not safe here." Castiel looked troubled, and that was bad news enough for Dean.

\- - -

\---

They caught each other up on the ride home. It was late by the time they got back to the motel, and Mary headed off to her room after a round of good nights.

Dean started to worry about what Cas was going to do all night. "Dibs on the shower," Sam called and charged into the bathroom.

"So," Dean nervously fussed with some crap on the table. "Tonight do you wanna—"

He turned around and Cas was _right there_ and then a second later Dean was pushed up against the wall and Cas had sealed their mouths together.

 _Well,_ Dean thought, _that answers one question._ And then he didn't think much at all, just kissed Cas back. Cas kissing him was so intense Dean felt like he'd sucked all the air out of him, like a fire was starting in his stomach, and he tried to pour some of that back at Cas because yeah, Dean felt it.

Cas fisted his hands in Dean's shirt and pressed against him so that Dean was pinned between Cas and the wall and someone moaned, low and dirty. Cas's tongue was in his mouth like he _owned_ it and Dean might have whimpered and his knees were getting weak but Cas had him so he wouldn't fall.

Dean reached out and grabbed Cas's hips, trying to pull him even closer, and ended up grinding their hips together. Cas was hard and hot and perfect and one of Dean's hands slid over to Cas's ass. 

Cas seemed to have forgotten that Dean needed to breathe so Dean had to turn his head away, sucking in huge pulls of air, while Cas just started sucking at Dean's neck. Dean's eyes rolled up. "Cas," he gasped, totally without meaning too, and Cas groaned in response and bit Dean's neck and Dean's knees buckled.

The shower shut off. Something in the back of Dean's head warned him that was bad, but then Cas licked Dean's ear and _nothing_ was bad. Dean got a hand in Cas's hair and pulled his head up so their mouths could meet again. This time he got his tongue in Cas's mouth— or Cas let him, more likely— and their tongues slid together wetly and tangled and yes, this was definitely what Dean wanted to do…

The hair dryer started up.

Because Sam was the type of person to dry his hair at midnight and Sam was _in the next room._

"Fuck, Cas, wait—" he tried to shove Cas away but his arms failed to work. Cas stopped anyway, and Dean pouted even though it was his own fault, and Cas pulled back enough to look him in the face. 

"You wish to desist because Sam is in the next room," Cas said.

"Dude, yeah, he's about to come out." The hair dryer shut off.

Cas stepped back, and Dean, whose legs had not yet recovered, slumped against the wall. He was also really, painfully, hard. 

The bathroom door opened.

Dean ducked behind the table. Cas, the bastard, just adjusted his coat.

Sam came out, dressed in sleep clothes, and stared at them. "Um," he said.

"What?" Dean snapped. "Finished at the salon yet?" He barged past Sam, moving fast as lightning, grabbed his bag, and locked in himself in the bathroom. 

In the mirror, he definitely looked like he'd been ravished against the wall. Holy shit, Cas had ravished him against the wall. And now Dean was going to jerk off in the shower thinking about it.

When he got out, Sam was sitting on his bed, frowning at his laptop. Cas was sitting at the table, ostensibly watching the tv. He sent Dean a look so heated that Dean knew that Cas absolutely knew what Dean had been doing in the shower. 

Dean cleared his throat, causing Sam to look up. "I'm trying to research," Sam said, "but I don't even know where to start looking."

"Yeah, let's call it a night," Dean said. "We'll regroup bright and early in the morning."

Castiel stood abruptly. "I should go."

"What? Where?" Dean demanded.

"I'll…go wait in the car."

"It's cold," Dean protested.

Both Cas and Sam gave him a weird look. "It doesn't bother me, Dean."

"Yeah, but… what will you do all night?"

"Perhaps I will borrow Sam's laptop."

"Wait, hey—"

"That's a great idea!" Dean grinned. Cas's eyes were almost twinkling.

"I—" Sam tried to say, but Dean walked over and pulled the laptop out of Sam's hands. 

"Here you go, Cas," he winked and walked Cas to the door.

"Sleep well, Dean."

"Enjoy your Netflix, Cas."

It had occurred to him that there was an unused bed in Mary's room, but getting Sam there would require a lot of explanations he wasn't ready to give yet.

When Dean turned around after locking the door, he found Sam giving him a bitch face. "What?" Dean said. 

"I was using that, Dean."

"You're going to sleep. And you were literally just bitching about how useless it was. Come on, what's the poor guy gonna do all night after you banished him to the car?"

" _I_ banished— you're the one who freaks out when he watches you sleep!"

"Oh right," Dean scoffed. "Because you didn't think it was creepy."

"I don't think he watches _me_ sleep, so much," Sam smirked.

"Yeah, 'cause you snore so loud no one has to check you're asleep."

Sam huffed but went to bed like a good boy. Dean hit the lights and tried not to think about Cas sitting out in the car and what they could have been doing if they'd banished Sam to the car instead.

\- - -

\---

In the morning Cas knocked on the door with four cups of coffee, which was just more proof that Dean had the best ideas and made the best choices. Or at least had the best taste.

"So," Mary said, once she'd drunk down half her coffee, "We got rid of Frank the overly-friendly ghost and now we have some kind of terrifying primordial monster running around the museum, is that about it?"

"Yep, no biggie," Dean said.

"And we have to find…what, where it hides? Sleeps?"

"Or we draw it out," Dean pointed out.

"Offer ourselves up as bait?" Sam asked.

Mary and Cas both frowned at them. "Or we could try to kill it while it's asleep," Mary said. "That sounds…better."

"Yes, mom," Dean and Sam chorused. 

"So how do we kill it?" Dean asked. But there, they had nothing.

"Angel blades?"

Cas shrugged. "There are very few things that can't be killed by them, but they do exist."

"An archangel," Dean listed, "A god? Leviathan. A Prince of Hell. The king of Hell?"

"No," Cas said cooly. "I could kill the king of Hell."

"A Knight of Hell?" Dean couldn't help it.

Cas gave him a look. "I could definitely get a Knight of Hell."

"Could you now?"

"O-kay," Sam said. "Before this gets any weirder, let's get back on topic. So an angel blade is a possibility. How many do we have?"

"Three," Dean said. "Including Cas's."

"What else do we have in the arsenal?" Mary asked.

"A grenade launcher," Dean said.

"You can't use a grenade launcher in a museum, Dean," Sam glared.

"Is that a bet?"

"It really isn't!"

"Boys," Mary sighed. "I need bacon if you're going to do this."

So they went to a diner, where they got a big circular booth, and Dean still crowded against Cas, who pressed his leg back against Dean's. "Do not make me flirt with the waitress this time," Cas murmured, for Dean's ear only.

Dean felt his ears get hot. 

While Dean and Sam and Mary ate, Cas acquired a newspaper and poured over it carefully for some reason.

"What are you looking for?" Sam asked. 

"It seems strange that this creature only just began attacking now," Cas said, not bothering to lower his voice, of course. "Either it was dormant and only recently disturbed, or it is a recent addition to the museum. I am looking for any clue."

The humans stared at him.

Cas hesitated. "Is that not…right?"

"That's brilliant Cas, good catch." Dean beamed at him and used the excuse to give him a big nudge. Castiel smiled down at the table, obviously pleased.

Dean looked away from Cas to see Sam and Mary exchanging a look. He was about to ask what that was about when the waitress stopped by with coffee refills.

"So anyways," Dean said when the waitress cleared off again, "I'm thinking Sam and mom go ask Amina about new stuff in the museum or construction or renovations."

"And what will you and Cas do?" Mary asked.

Dean beamed. "Assemble the arsenal."

"No grenade launchers," Sam said.

Dean used his fork to point at Sam. "You, research. Me, weapons."

"No," Mary said. "We should _all_ go to the museum. We ask about new exhibits and plan our attack for tonight, if necessary." She gave a Dean a look like she almost knew what he'd been up to. Dean pouted a little but supposed that if he'd made it to 37 before getting cock blocked by his mom, that was pretty good.

The museum had a closed sign on the door, but Amina was there, in her car again. "I didn't feel safe inside," she said. "What the hell happened last night?" 

"Well, we did talk to Frank…" Mary frowned. Amina's reaction seemed over the top.

"I'm glad you're all all right," she said. "But…inside?"

"Inside?" Sam repeated. 

"I think we'd better all go in," Amina said.

The entrance hall was a mess. A huge display case had been flung down from the second story, and bits of wood and glass and— insects? Gross— were scattered everywhere.

"What the…" Dean trailed off.

"This was…this had not happened when we left last night," Mary said.

Cas, of course, had crouched down to look— and now he was poking— at the dead insects. Dean casually wandered over and smacked him on the shoulder. "These are all African beetles," Cas said, glaring at Dean. If the dude didn't want to get smacked, he should stop poking at glass shards and dead bugs.

"That's right," Amina blinked at him in surprise. "Are you an entomologist?"

Dean bit his lip.

"Not at all," Cas said, rising to his feet. He looked at Dean, who elected not to be helpful. "I am…familiar with many aspects of creation."

"Oh," Amina said, which was pretty much the only response to that. "Well…what could have done this? And— what was that you said about Frank?"

Mary filled her in on most of what happened the night before, leaving out only angel stuff.

"Hey, Dean," Sam said when she finished, "we did hear that thump last night."

"It wasn't this, though," Dean nudged at ruined bits of the case with his boot. "We wouldn't have missed this mess when we were leaving. It was also definitely on the third floor."

Sam nodded. "Yeah, but it couldn't have been Frank, right? So what the hell was it?"

"It did not stir while we were here," Cas said. "But…we may have woken it last night." He sounded just guilty enough that Dean parsed that Cas meant _he_ might have woken it last night. 

Dean drew Cas away and Sam followed. "Do you think it's grace-sensitive?"

"That much grace would have been noticeable to many beings, including demons," Cas shrugged.

"How much grace?" Dean narrowed his eyes. "Do you feel okay?"

Cas gave him a withering look. "Sending a ghost to Heaven is hardly going to exhaust me, Dean."

"Okay," Sam said quickly. "So good news: Cas does some fancy tricks, the monster shows up. That's helpful, right?"

Cas drew himself up, offended. "They are not _tricks,_ Sam."

Dean, who always thought it was hilarious when Sam and Cas had their little nerd fights, grinned.

"Boys!" When they turned around, Mary waved at them, heavy on the sarcasm.

"Coming," they all muttered. 

Amina huffed a laugh. 

\- - -

\---

Amina told them there hadn't been any new acquisitions by the museum for quite some time. "We did move some of the display cases around," she said. "I'll show you."

They went up to the second floor, where two rooms had been redone. "New labels and everything," Amina said. She sighed. "Is this really what set it off? Because of some redecorating, poor Mr. Quinto is dead?"

"It was going to happen sooner or later," Mary said. "And we don't know for sure what triggered the activity."

"It wasn't your fault," Sam stressed.

Amina smiled weakly. "I'll stick around for a couple hours in case you have any questions."

"Thanks," Mary said.

"Give us a shout if you see anything weird," Dean said. "Or feel anything weird. And I mean anything, okay? Even if it's just a feeling. Don't hesitate."

She nodded. "I will, thank you. Let me know if I can be any help. Good luck."

They waited for Amina to get downstairs before getting to work. The EMF meter was quiet, and there was nothing that had visible ritual writing or markings. Not their kind of markings, anyway. 

The room was full of African artifacts and stuffed wildlife. There were drums, a rhino horn, two large white birds, a truly ugly fake hyena, baskets, and a case full of beads and pottery. The next room had a little bronze statue that caused some hopeful excitement, but after unlocking the case Cas said it was just a statue.

"Tonight we might as well focus on these rooms," Dean said. "The guard was killed downstairs but maybe he picked it up on his rounds through this room. It could've stalked him for a while first."

"Playing with its prey?" Sam asked.

Dean shrugged. "Hard to say until we see it."

They checked over the rest of the exhibits, wandering in and out of rooms and at least getting a solid feel for the museum's layout. 

At one point, Dean realized mom and Sam were upstairs and Amina downstairs, and he and Cas were alone. He cornered Cas behind a display case full of Japanese scrolls and kissed him. He nipped and sucked at Cas's lower lip, sliding a hand into Cas's hair and re-tousling it. Cas hummed into Dean's mouth and slid his hands under Dean's jacket and around his waist. 

Then he pushed Dean back gently. "Not here."

"Really?" 

Cas nodded over Dean's shoulder. The case was full of statues of Shiva and Kali. There was a particularly large wooden statue of Kali directly across from them.

_"Really?"_

Cas shrugged. "She can see through all her statues. It's a little awkward."

Dean just stared at him. 

"You wouldn't want to make out in front of one of Sam's ex-girlfriends," Cas said, getting a little snippy.

Dean had never actually thought about that particular situation and now he could only agree that it would be weird, so Dean let Cas slip out of his arms and wandered over to take a closer look at the Kali statue. He stuck his tongue out at her.

\---

The museum was quiet and Cas wasn't picking up anything significant enough to be useful. He kept wandering around the second floor, frustrated he couldn't pinpoint the source, until Dean made him stop. Amina gave them the keys to all the doors and cases and they had permission to come back that night.

There wasn't much else to do until it got dark, and Dean hated this part. He hated sitting on his ass just waiting. And Sam seemed everywhere, suddenly, and so did Cas, and Dean was going to lose his mind. He wanted to go for a drive but Sam and Mary kept going into the trunk for stuff so he was stuck. There was no place to go for a walk, and Cas kept _looking_ at him.

Dean snapped at all of them until Sam finally said " _Dude!_ Just go out and get some beer already!"

So Dean did— alone, because Sam was making Cas help him with some bullshit list— and he did feel better, afterwards, and they all sat around and had a beer and ate fries and it was finally fucking night time.

\- - -

\---

The museum's outside lights were still on, giving an appropriately horror-movie look to the whole thing, with dark clouds swirling behind the house and the wind picking up.

"My phone says it's going to snow," Mary said, wrapping her jacket around her tightly.

"I hope we don't have to make a quick getaway," Sam glanced up the sky.

The destroyed display case in the entrance hall had been mostly cleaned up or brushed aside. "What do you think?" Dean asked Cas as they stood there, trying to get a feel for the place tonight.

"I think…it's not as asleep as it was before," Cas said.

"All right," Mary checked her weapon and nodded to them. "So we're sticking with the plan? Split up, Sam and I start down here, Dean and Cas, you're heading up to the third floor?"

They agreed and Dean and Cas started up the stairs, both of them wordlessly jostling to take point. 

In the dark, the shadows were deep and the display cases loomed a lot more than they had in daylight. Dean was used to that, though, and he was used to the creaking old houses did. He could hear Cas breathing next to him.

"Anything?" Dean whispered.

Cas's breath turned into a frustrated huff. "I still can't pinpoint it."

"As long as it's not, you know, breathing down our necks yet."

\- - -

\---

The rooms downstairs that were open to the public were a gift shop, on the left, and a sort of introductory/information room on the right. There wasn't all that much in them and Sam and Mary swept them quickly. The back offices, on the other hand, were a pain in the ass.

Sam found himself checking for hex bags and sigils on the off chance, but everything looked like it belonged to a modern office. The larger rooms had even been divided up with cubicle walls. It was actually a little disappointing. They really did keep everything cool on the second and third floors.

"I don't think Dean and Castiel are fighting anymore," Mary said. "They seem to be getting along fine now. Dean made sure Cas went along with him tonight."

Sam thought about it and decided not to tell her that Dean would definitely make someone pair off with him just so he could continue to berate them. "Yeah, I think they fixed whatever weird—"

Sam cut himself off immediately and held his breath, listening hard. His mom had also frozen. There was nothing but thick silence for a few long moments. "What did you hear?" Mary finally whispered.

Sam shook his head. "I'm not sure I did hear anything. I just thought…" he struggled to describe it. "It wasn't something I heard so much as something I felt."

Mary hurried over next to him. "Something touched you?"

"No," Sam huffed out a frustrated breath. "More like a change in air pressure."

"Like…it breathed on you?"

Sam wished she hadn't said that, because he couldn't brush the idea aside. They didn't have all the lights on— they'd left the main lights off, but turned on a few desk lamps. Enough to know there hadn't been anything else in the room with them.

Unless— "Crap," Sam said. "What if it's invisible?" 

\- - -

\---

Dean and Cas never made it to the third floor. They were on their way, passing through what might be the world's creepiest room, next to a display case of wooden masks with rectangular slits for eyes and mouths. A faint vibration passed through the room, although only, as far as Dean could tell, the walls— the floor seemed to hold still. The masks rattled in their case.

"What the hell was that?" Dean asked.

Cas was frowning as he turned around, probably trying to locate the source. "It was a… a sort of involuntary emission caused by the creature we're hunting."

"An involuntary emission? What, like a fart?"

Cas gave him a look. "I would not characterize it like that."

"You wouldn't, yeah, but you're bad at expressing yourself."

" _I'm_ bad at expressing myself?" 

And now this had gotten out of hand and 100% not what Dean wanted to get into right now. But it was Cas who ended that line of discussion when he grabbed Dean by the arm and hauled him behind him. When an angel hauls you somewhere you go. It was all Dean could do to keep his feet under him.

"What?" he whispered, when he stopped moving.

"It's in the next room," Cas breathed.

"Good," Dean answered. He pulled out his angel blade. "I'm ready to party. You know what it is yet?"

Cas nodded. "I'm afraid I do. I— didn't think any of them could be left."

"What is it?"

"There is no word in any human language for what it is. The closest thing is…annihilator."

There was something about that word and the anxiety (and dread?) in Cas's voice that sent a shiver down Dean's spine.

"When you say you didn't think there were any left… what happened to the others?"

"Michael and Raphael killed them. There was concern humans would not arise if they persisted."

"Wow, that's— wait, what do you mean, 'not arise'?"

"As far as I know, no member of _Homo sapiens_ has ever fought one before."

"This is the worst pep talk you've ever given."

"It wasn't intended to be a pep talk."

"No shit." After a moment, Dean added: "Should've brought the grenade launcher."

They didn't so much hear it as feel it— maybe there was a shift in the air currents, maybe it made the floorboards shift just a little under their feet. Maybe it was something else, but Cas tensed further, ready to fight (and ready to die defending Dean, knowing him), and Dean was already doing the same. 

There was a long, sliding, grinding sound from the other room. "The fuck is that?" Dean breathed, before he remembered the long spears. Had it pulled one? Did it need weapons, or was it just fucking with them?

An angel blade had never felt insubstantial— they had a heft Dean liked, and the balance was perfect, of course, but they did seem suddenly very short.

"You wanna wait for it or go out to—" Dean started, but Cas, the asshole, charged ahead, _without Dean,_ and Dean was caught flat-footed for about 3 seconds before he swore and chased after him.

Cas was fast as fuck when he wanted to be, and Dean only saw the edge of his trench coat disappearing through the next doorway. Dean mentally swore again but didn't waste his breath, and followed. It did occur to him that he ought to contact Sam and Mary, but he'd get to that as soon as he made sure Cas wasn't doing something extremely stupid here. 

Archangels had been sent to slay these things before— there had to be a reason Heaven sent Douche #1 and Douche #3 instead of regular angels, or even a garrison of them.

The next room was actually the upper hallway, with several doorways and of course no fucking sign of fucking Cas. "Come _on,_ " Dean hissed. They were so gonna have words.

Something clattered, just a little, in the first room on the right, and Dean moved, pretty silently considering the creaky floor, to flank the side of the doorway. Back braced against the wall, he leaned over to peer through the doorway.

No sign of Cas, he noticed first, and there were no other doors out of the room. No obvious big bad ugly thing, either. Dean slowly moved into the room, keeping his back to the wall. The room wasn't huge, but thanks to the display cases Dean didn't have a clear line of sight.

His instincts were screaming at him that he wasn't alone in here, and Dean's instincts were damn good. He moved carefully around the edge of the room, and it became increasingly clear the room was empty. Maybe he was just jumpy, Dean thought, but he didn't let his guard down.

Cas hadn't said anything about what these annihilator things were supposed to look like. Could they turn invisible? Completely blend into the shadows? Dean suddenly tensed and checked the ceiling, but it appeared just as empty as the rest of the room. The cases were mostly solid to the floor, and Dean wondered if something could be hiding inside one. But when he looked at the nearest one, there didn't seem any way to get inside it— the locks were all for the clear display parts.

Okay. Dean exhaled, and decided to treat the room as cleared. He headed for the door, and was almost there when behind him he heard a repeat of the clatter from earlier, and then immediately he knew to duck— and where his head had been a second before, flew a pottery vase, on its way to shatter against the wall.

"Son of a bitch."

Dean spun to face whatever threw the pot but there was still nothing there— to his eyes at least. "Come on, don't wanna face me?" Dean called.

Nothing. Nothing moved, no noise, nothing. 

Right. Dean was going to find Cas. Maybe he'd be able to see the damn thing.

Half-backwards, Dean slid out of the room. Nothing tried to interfere this time. "Cas?" he shouted when he was back in the hallway. No point in pretending he wasn't here now.

There wasn't any answer and now Dean was flat-out worried, so he started to run through the upper landing. Across from the next doorway on the left, something side-swiped him. It was nothing like a car.

Dean went ass over head into the next room, rolling to a stop against a display case. It wasn't comfortable. The adrenline kept him from feeling any pain, though, and luckily the case had kept his angel blade from rolling too far away. Dean was back on his feet in moments, and he could finally see it.

Kind of.

It was black, definitely, so black that light didn't work correctly around it. It didn't reflect any light, only absorbed it, and something about the shifting edges made Dean's brain rebel. _No,_ it decided. _You are not seeing that. That's not how things_ work.

It was big, too, more than filling the doorway. Features almost resolved on its face— the glitter of eyes were there, the only bit that did reflect light, but Dean couldn't tell if there were two or ten or a hundred. Did it have fur? Scales? Feathers? His eyes couldn't focus on anything long enough to tell, and when he tried to count the legs (Arms? Claws? Wings?) his brain just went _nope_ and put a stop to it.

Dean was frozen, because whatever the hell it was, it was reacting to something within him on a level so deep he hadn't known it was there. His fight-or-flight response was stuck firmly on FLIGHT. And that never happened to him, not anymore. But it was blocking the doorway, of course.

And then it spoke.

"I know you," it whispered. It sounded almost delighted. "You are like me." It spoke rhythmically, with deliberation. Dean, for once in his life, had no thought of interrupting.

"I have heard much of you, Dean Winchester." Dean jumped at his name. It smiled, and its teeth were the gleam of a hundred knives in the night. "You and your brother have become a legend to the things in the dark. The things the monsters whisper about to scare each other. They say you are feared by gods, the Righteous Man who became a Knight of Hell, the Michael Sword who defied God. They say that you slew all the dark things that walked the Earth and then followed them to Purgatory and slew them again. I hear that place still trembles at your name, and that you have beaten both Heaven and Hell at their games. They say demons fear to deal with you and Lucifer curses your name. They say an angel went mad with love for you and the king of Hell does your bidding. A creature of darkness who resisted The Darkness. They say you can kill the unkillable, but you yourself can never die. That you killed Death himself."

Dean wasn't sure he could move.

"But I am the better monster, Dean Winchester. You know nothing of me, and I know everything of you." 

It was… it was the kind of creature that liked to talk a lot. With that thought, most of its spell broke.

"Yeah, well, 'they' sure talk a lot. Not all of it's true." Dean grinned back, and it was the grin of something dangerous. "But some of it is. And right now you're standing between me and my family. Does that seem like a real safe place to be?"

It hissed, but it didn't sound angry. It sounded…delighted. It was some kind of laughter.

It…fluffed? Ruffled? Something along its shoulders (or head. Or both) and made some other movement Dean's brain gave up trying to keep track of. No wonder the poor Neanderthals couldn't fight these things, just looking at it gave you a migraine.

"I look forward to this fight, Dean Winchester," it said.

"Then let's dance," he said. 

\- - -

\---

Mary frowned down at her phone. "They're not responding."

Sam huffed a breath through his mouth, half-exasperation, half-worry. "All right," he said, "let's head up."

\- - -

\---

Definitely should've brought the grenade launcher. He was never listening to Sam again.

Dean had an angel blade but he couldn't land a hit. He just couldn't seem to figure out how far to lunge— he had no depth perception with this thing, or else it just flowed away from his blade like…like a Knight of Hell fighting a human, to be honest.

The only reason Dean wasn't in pieces on the floor was because it hadn't bothered to attack him yet. It was playing with him, and Dean was definitely the mouse in this scenario. Dean hated being the mouse.

Cas could throw an angel blade across a room, but he could also make it return to him. If Dean threw his blade, it'd be gone.

"I didn't mean dancing quite so literally," Dean said, because he was the worst.

There was that smile again, and it stopped Dean's heart and turned his stomach, and then his new monster friend was _right there_ and it reached out and the whole room turned around Dean. 

Or he went tumbling through the room.

He whacked his head on the corner of a display case and stars exploded everywhere. _One concussion._

And the angel blade had dropped out of his hand. Dean struggled to get his eyes to focus while frantically feeling around, hoping to run into it by luck.

He felt a breeze curl past his face. It was cold, not warm, but it was a breath. Dean looked up and his headache intensified. The annihilator was standing right over him. Dean saw lots and lots and lots of eyes before he had to close his own.

"I admit I am a little disappointed," it said. It smelled like death. "I thought you would be more of a challenge."

"He is extremely challenging," Cas announced. His voice was a ridiculous mix of offense, pride, affection, and derision that probably no one else but Dean would hear. "He is also not alone." If Dean hadn't already been mostly passed out on the floor, he might have swooned a little.

Dean couldn't quite see Cas around the monster but he could somehow track the angel blade as it flew through the air, a meteor of light and celestial steel.

It sliced right into the monster— Cas could hardly miss. He could've hit a mosquito at that range and the creature was massive. So his blade sliced right into the monster— and _through_ it. The blade passed cleanly through the monster's shuddering, shadowy form, and smashed into the display case above Dean's head. It completely shattered all the shatter-proof glass, and glass rained down on Dean like acid rain.

"What?" Dean said.

_"What,"_ Cas said. 

The thing laughed. It also turned toward Cas. "Angel," it noted. "So that part was true." 

"You should not be here, abomination," Cas said, pulling out the Angel of the Lord voice. 

"But here I am," the monster didn't seem impressed. 

"Yes, how?" 

Dean couldn't see anything now, but he knew the squinty glare Cas was making. 

It did not answer— or maybe its answer was the lunge it made toward Cas. Dean finally got his shit together and shook off the glass. He got to his feet and wobbled around to grab Cas's angel blade from where it lay on the other side of the case. Dean wasn't sure if the effect was real or placebo, but it felt better in his hand than the usual scavenged ones he used. Speaking of— Dean's head had cleared a little, and he finally spotted the blade he'd dropped earlier. He grabbed that, too, and turned to find Cas leading the beast out of the room. Dean, of course, charged after them. 

Sam and Mary were at the top of the stairs, looking startled. "What the—" Sam started. 

"—Hell happened to you?" Mary cut him off. 

"I'm fine," Dean said. "Where'd they go?" How did he keep losing Cas in this place? It just wasn't that big. You could only see for about five feet in any direction, though. 

"Through there," Sam pointed at the far side of the hallway, where the African taxidermy shit was concentrated. There wasn't really any place else for them to go, which Dean would've figured out right away if his head wasn't pounding like the world's least-fun subwoofer. 

He didn't bother saying "let's go"; he knew Sam would follow. 

There was a very large crash, and Dean sort of slammed into the doorway and hung on to keep himself upright. 

Cas— probably it was Cas, anyway— had tipped over a large display case. Apparently he'd tipped it over _on_ the monster, but the monster just stood in the ruins, not very bothered. 

Cas's angel blade vanished from Dean's hand, and he just had time to shout "Hey!" before Cas ran at the monster. Either because it had beat the crap out of Dean or for some angel reason (or maybe a combo), Cas seemed to take this monster really personally. He charged straight at the damn thing and stabbed it right between the eyes. 

Dean was holding his breath, watching Cas take a careful step back. Sam was breathing down Dean's neck. 

The annihilator had frozen, and Dean thought he saw a burst of… was it grace?… run over the dark grotesque form like lightning. Maybe this had done it… 

It shook the angel blade out like a porcupine shooting a quill. "Well that's not good," Sam said. 

"Glad you're caught up." Dean said, and forced himself into the room. Partly he was kind of incredibly hurt, and partly it was just hard to put himself closer to the monster. 

The shadows looked like they were coiling, and Dean thought that was it getting ready to lunge or pounce or whatever. He started picking things up and throwing them. 

"Hey! Fugly!" 

"Dean!" Cas looked furious. "Get out of here!" 

Dean didn't dignify that with a response. He picked up a surprisingly heavy pot and chucked it at the nearest part of the monster. 

It flinched. It was hard to tell, what with the whole vague amorphous shadowy form thing, but it definitely seemed to flicker and flinch from the pot. The really heavy pot. 

"Holy shit," Dean said, and then louder, "it doesn't like iron!" 

_"Iron?"_ Sam said. "It shook off an angel blade!" 

"Yeah, well…" and when Dean looked at it, it all fell into place. "It's a ghost!" 

"Dean, it can't be a—" whiny academic Sam was cut off as the black bulk swung its many, many eyes and many, many teeth around to face Dean and Sam. 

"You are a clever monkey after all," it said, in its voice like Doom, except Dean had met his doom many times before. This was really kind of just a voice like Sauron. 

Mary was nearest the door to the room. "Mom, salt and burn," he said, and tossed the Impala keys to her. 

She barely tore her gaze away from the monster in time, but her hand was steady when she caught the keys. "On it." She disappeared out the door. 

Cas had retrieved the heavy pot and threw it at the monster again, bouncing it off its head this time. It definitely flinched. 

Dean lunged for the far wall and the rack of giant spears. Some of them were wood but two or three had iron points. He felt _much_ better when he and Sam each had one of those in their hands. 

"We don't know what to salt and burn," Sam hissed under his breath. 

"Why don't you go figure it out?" Dean hissed back. 

"What do I even look for?" 

"You've got the genius brain, figure it out! Now go, Cas and I got this." 

Sam looked like he really didn't want to leave, but in the end he was practical, and they couldn't keep it at bay forever. Taking his spear rather awkwardly, Sam ran out of the room. 

The monster…the noise it made was some kind of roar, but it sounded wrong, like an insect roar, and so high-pitched that for a moment Dean was afraid his brain might boil in his skull. He wondered if that was Concussion Two. 

Then Dean leveled his spear, let out his own roar (learned on the battlefields of Moondoor), and charged. 

His spear was about eight feet long and the room was small and trashed, so he couldn't get much of a running start. At first, the iron point sunk in so easily Dean was afraid he'd been wrong. 

But then the black mass in front of him flickered and the air pressure dropped, suddenly enough that Dean's ears popped. It was kind of painful, actually. The spear dropped in his hands, sagging down and clinking on the floor as the ghost monster flickered out.

Dean looked wide-eyed at Cas, but Cas shook his head and lunged to get himself a spear.

Just in time, too.

\- - -

\---

It was one thing for Dean to say "Go figure it out!" and another thing _entirely_ for Sam to do it. But he remembered the thump from the third floor on their first night, and it made sense there was something up in storage. He had to leave the spear down below, though, there was no way he could carry it around up there. 

Sam gulped as he looked around the third floor. It wasn't exactly the hardest thing they'd ever had to figure out, but there was definitely a time crunch and Sam was very aware that Dean and Cas were downstairs armed with Iron Age spears and not much else. 

He had no EMF meter, no time or ingredients for spell work…what else was up here? A library. Marion had said she'd been working in the library up here. Hoping and praying for acquisition records, Sam ran down the hallway. 

\- - - 

\---

It was kind of like bullfighting, if bullfighting involved the scariest fucking thing on the planet and the bulls could suddenly disappear and reappear behind you. 

At least Dean and Cas were side-by-side, and Dean finally knew where the fuck the angel was. Unfortunately, Cas hadn't been able to put down the spear long enough to heal Dean, and those two probable concussions were definitely throwing Dean's aim off. 

"I can't tell if these actually hurt it or just piss it off," he said to Cas.

"I believe they cause pain but no lasting damage," Cas said, before ducking as a huge…paw-tentacle thing swiped at his head. Dean tried to stab the limb but was too slow. Stupid heavy giant spear. 

"Fuck," Dean grunted.

"This is becoming dull," the monster said, which was pretty rude of it. It was also rude when it grabbed Dean's spear (the shaft, not the pointy iron part) and snatched it away from him. 

"Hey!" Dean was thrown off balance and stumbled to his knees. "I was using that!" 

The monster tossed the spear behind itself with a large clatter. "You have given me entertainment, hunters. But I am grown bored of this game." 

"Oh yeah?" Dean forced himself, through screaming muscles, to his feet. "What are you going to do about it?" 

\- - - 

\---

It was hopeless. Sam knew it was hopeless, but he didn't know how to stop, what to do next. The records weren't helpful, and they weren't going to be helpful— no one knew what this thing was, that it was there, and there was _nothing…_

His phone rang, and Sam glanced at it long enough to see it was Mary before answering. "Mom?" 

"Sam. What's going on? Where are you?" 

Sam filled her in with a few clipped words. "But the artifact the monster's tied to has to be inside the house, right?" 

"Uh, yeah, I guess." 

"Then we burn the whole house." 

"Mom—" 

"Sam. We have to stop it." 

Sam swallowed. "Yeah," he said. "Of course, yes." 

"Then come downstairs and help me with the salt and gas. Let's get your brother and Castiel out and burn the whole place, okay?" 

"I'm on my way," Sam said. 

\- - - 

\---

Castiel clearly thought Dean should have kept his big mouth shut. Cas was probably right. 

The monster didn't even bother to laugh before it swiped at Dean. Dean almost didn't notice slamming into yet another display case. Was he on the floor? It seemed like he was on the floor. 

The monster roared again. Or— howled? Dean managed to raise his head, and even though the room was spinning, he could make out Castiel twisting his spear in the creature's side. 

Cas seemed to have worked out a way to keep the spear actually in the monster, and he'd managed to keep hold of the spear, too, so they were circling each other at either end of a large wooden pole. It would've almost looked funny, if Castiel's face hadn't been so furious and an eldritch abomination hadn't been on the other end of the stick.

It looked like the monster was trying to jerk the spear out of Cas's hands, but Cas was holding on tight. Maybe it couldn't vanish while iron was in it? It didn't exactly follow normal ghost rules. 

Dean pushed himself to his feet once again and stumbled over to where the monster had thrown his spear. He picked it up, noting his left shoulder might be dislocated, and turned to face the monster. 

The monster seemed to have had enough. It roared, and whirled like some kind of blender ninja star. One or several of its limbs smacked into Cas, and sent him flying. 

And this time, it had used its claws. 

\- - - 

\---

Sam almost ducked into the room to check on Dean and Cas and the truly awful noises he was hearing but the front door slammed and he ran down to meet his mom. 

She had somehow managed to bring a large sack of salt and two gas canisters with her; she shoved the salt at Sam immediately. 

"We should set the fire upstairs," Mary said. "The library will catch fast, right? And those dead animals will burn fast, too." 

It was against everything in Sam's very being to burn books, but she wasn't wrong. And he had no other ideas. 

A large crash echoed from upstairs. 

"Shit," Mary said, and ran up the stairs, leaving Sam to follow behind her. 

\- - -

\---

The monster had sent Cas flying into one of the crappy dioramas and he'd crashed into the stupid fake hyena. Dean froze, held his breath, until Cas sat up. He oddly didn't look completely inappropriate, sitting there on an African savanna, business suit shredded and _Jesus fuck that was a lot of blood_ in great big scratches on his chest. 

Cas's face went from shocked to thunderous to confused, but Dean didn't waste any more time and charged at the monster, who was busy working the spear out of its side. 

He got a good hit, at least, and the monster howled and whirled but Dean had finally learned, and as soon as he felt the spear tip catch he ran away. He ducked behind a still intact display case, because that little charge had winded him. He felt nauseated too, probably from his two concussions. 

"DEAN!" 

Dean crawled forward to look at Cas. Cas was…holding the fake hyena head in his hands. 

"Dean," Cas said, when he saw Dean looking at him, "this is the monster's skull." 

"What did you say, Angel?" the monster looked even worse with two spears sticking out of it. They'd fixed its ever-changing mass a little, right around where the spears went in, which actually just made things worse, like a little sandbar in a stormy sea. Looking at it just made Dean more nauseous. 

Cas looked right at the monster. "This is your skull," he said. "Someone mistook you for a hyena." He smiled. 

The monster lunged, and Cas threw the skull to Dean. Dean had to lunge forward to catch it, and then stayed forward, fighting down the really strong urge to toss his cookies. He swallowed, which was disgusting, but throwing up would be even more disgusting. 

Then he looked at the head Cas had thrown. The fake hyena was a sort of fiberglass mold, but sure enough, there was a real skull of some kind inside.

If Cas said this was it, this was it. 

"I do not fear angels," the monster said. 

Oh shit.

Dean looked up to see Cas facing off with it with his angel blade in hand. His shirt was still bloody tatters, but he had healed enough he wasn't actively bleeding, at least. He looked pretty badass, Dean thought, but that angel blade had done exactly jack shit to the monster before.

Dean tucked the head under his arm like a football, ready to run. He didn't know what to do, but he'd distract it, something, anything, to get it away from Cas.

"Dean!"

It was mom, and Sam behind her, in the doorway.

"Burn this!" he shouted, and threw them the head. 

Sam had to drop the sack of salt to catch it. He only looked confused for a second, then he caught on. He dropped the head to the floor and he and Mary got busy.

That was taken care of, then.

Dean needed some iron. He looked around the mostly trashed room, looking for iron anything. He finally spotted that damn pot, and grabbed it.

Cas had more or less been holding his own, but the annihilator had worked a spear free. It threw it at Cas. 

Cas ducked it easily, though. He turned to go for the spear where it clattered around the diorama, and the monster swiped at him again, sending him spinning across the room. 

It looked terrifying, even though Cas rolled to his feet quickly. 

"Hey Casper!" Dean shouted. And then he hesitated, because he really wanted a good line, but he was super fucking exhausted. "Bite me." He threw the pot and it smacked about where he thought the monster's face should be. 

It didn't like that. It lunged across the room, faster than Dean could blink, and it hit him. And it used its claws. 

Streaks of fire ripped across his torso, such breathtaking sharp pain Dean didn't notice right away that he'd been knocked on his ass. He heard people calling his name but his ears were ringing, until "Dean!" in Sam's voice cut through, as it always would. Goddam, he was tired of getting tossed around.

Dean rolled onto his side, pushing himself up. The pain made everything go white and then black, but he breathed through it. The monster screamed. Mary and Sam had at last caught the skull on fire, and now the monster was a flaming giant monstrosity.

It wasn't quite done, though, and pushed over a display case onto Castiel in rage.

"Dean!" Sam called again, and this time he slid the last iron tipped spear across the floor towards Dean. 

_It's only going to hurt for a little bit,_ Dean told himself. _Then it will be over._ He pulled the spear closer and staggered to his feet. 

Picking up the spear was about a thousand times harder than picking up any other weapon had ever been. Once it was up and balanced in his arms though, bleeding chest and dislocated shoulder and all, it was much easier to run at the monster's back, letting momentum carry him.

The spear pierced through, and Dean really felt it go in this time. It went straight through and stuck, amusingly, into the remains of the fiberglass hyena, minus the head.

Shish-kabob. 

Dean grinned. "I told you once, you son of a bitch," he said, around great panting breaths, "I'm the best there's ever been." He spat out blood. 

"You're really proud of yourself for that, aren't you?" Sam said, having run over to help Dean stay upright.

"Hell yes I am, Sammy. Yes I am."

The monster, the last annihilator, flailed on its spike as it burned. And then, with a puff of ash, it was gone.

Castiel came shuffling toward them, hand already out, and Dean leaned into his hand eagerly. They might be a little dependant on angel healing, but oh god, it felt so good for every ache and pain to lift away, like taking off the world's most uncomfortable coat. Breathing didn't hurt, moving his head didn't hurt… 

"How many concussions?" he grinned at Cas. 

"Two," Cas scowled. "Sam?"

Sam shook him off. "I'm fine. You look like you need it more than me."

"Oh my god, Dean." Mary had stayed to make sure the last of the skull burned (and the fire didn't get out of control), but now she threw her arms around Dean and squeezed him tight. Dean nuzzled into her shoulder because she was his mom and he'd almost died like ten times tonight, so fuck it. It was nice. She stroked his hair and then pushed him back and patted his chest. His shirt was still ripped and bloodstained, but of course the scratches were all healed.

Then Mary turned to Cas. "Oh, Castiel," she said. "Thank you." And threw her arms around him. Cas sent panicked looks over her shoulder at Dean and Sam, but they just laughed. When Mary let him go, Dean reached out and settled a hand on Cas's shoulder. Squeezed. Didn't quite let go. 

"How you doing, buddy?"

"I'll be fine," Cas said. He swayed on his feet. "After some rest," he admitted.

"We really trashed the place," Mary noted, looking at the destroyed room. One display case was intact, if you didn't count the crack running along the side. 

"At least we didn't have to burn the whole thing," Sam sighed.

Cas made them sweep up all the ashes from the burning, just in case. "Should we keep them in the bunker?" Dean asked. 

Cas brooded at the little baggie. "No," he decided. "I'll scatter them somewhere. Later." He yawned, then looked startled, to Dean's amusement. 

"Definitely later," he agreed. 

They locked the museum behind them. It was snowing outside, making everything soft and quiet and clean. Dean eased his way into Baby. It felt like a million years since he'd last been in her. He stroked a reverent hand along the steering wheel. "Ready to go, sweetheart?" he whispered. 

"Dean," Cas said, at maximum grumpiness, "now is not the time for you to fondle the car." 

Sam burst into wheezing laughter next to Dean, letting his head thump against the window. Dean glared at Sam, and at Cas in the mirror, and then gave a sharp look at Mary, who was clearly biting her lip. 

"You can all walk back," he said. "In the snow." 

"Do you need someone else to drive, sweetie?" Mary asked. That was the last straw, and Dean started the car in stony silence that seemed to make no impact on his family. 

Assholes. 

Dean was smiling by the time he pulled up at the motel. "Hey Cas," he asked, perfectly casually, "you need to sleep, right?" 

"I believe I do need to rest for a few hours, yes." 

Dean nodded. "Sam, go sleep in the other bed in mom's room. If that's okay with you, mom?" 

"Wait, what?" Sam had dozed off against the window in the 25 minutes it took them to get home. 

"Cas is taking your bed," Dean announced, and got out of the car. Matter settled. 

Sam was hilariously too sleepy to protest. He gathered his bag (and his laptop, the little bitch) and shuffled off after their mom. 

Dean steered Cas into their room with a hand on his shoulder. Dean was a fucking mastermind. He was king of the world today. 

"How much do you need to sleep?" Dean asked. 

"Meditate," Cas corrected. The look in his eye said he saw right through Dean. "And…eventually." 

\- - -

\---

Dean felt mostly relief when he locked the door behind them. It hadn't really had time to sink in, but tonight had been much, much tougher than he'd thought it would be. 

He turned around to find Cas hovering awkwardly in the middle of the room. So, business as usual. 

"How you doing?" he asked. 

"I'm recovering," Cas said. 

"Slowly."

"Yes," Cas agreed, and almost smiled. "Luckily it was only a ghost, and much weakened." 

"Jesus." It was a good thing Dean kept his hair short, or he'd end up pulling it all out. "That's why archangels had to destroy them? They can actually hurt angels pretty good, right? You didn't mention that!" 

Cas rolled his eyes without actually rolling his eyes. Dean could tell. "I hardly had time to give you all the information on them. If you recall, I didn't know what we'd be facing until we were face to face with it." 

"Yeah. I seem to remember you charging off without a warning or backup or anything." 

"Yes," Cas said, not sorry at all. "I was trying to keep you away from it as much as possible." His tone was implying something like keeping Dean from trouble was a pointless effort. He wasn't wrong. 

They'd been slowly moving together as they talked, drawn inexorably like magnets or planets in orbit, and Dean was sure, now, that they always, always would be. And he was good with that. Liked it, wanted it, even. It was the only thing that kept him going sometimes, knowing that Cas would eventually find his way back. 

Dean wasn't even still pissed about Cas taking off in the museum earlier, although he'd been stressed enough about it at the time. Maybe he was just too drained to get angry again tonight. 

Maybe he could think of better things to do. 

"How're those claw marks doing?" Dean asked. They were close enough now that when Cas went to pull the remains of his shirt apart to check, his arms brushed Dean.

"Healing," he decided. "I will be fully recovered by morning." 

Dean looked and saw the scratches were still angry and red and kind of huge, but they were closed up at least. "Okay," he said, and when he looked up, Cas and his face and his mouth were right there, so Dean kissed him. 

Cas's hands smoothed up Dean's chest and settled on his shoulders, his fingers wrapping around the back of Dean's neck, pulling him in closer. 

They kissed for a while, deep and slow, taking their time. They hadn't done this before, hadn't had the chance. 

Dean let himself melt into Cas, let everything else dissolve away, except for his hands on Cas's waist, the warmth of his skin through the thin fabric, and the sharp, stubbled line of his jaw under Dean's mouth as he kissed down Cas's jaw to his neck. 

"Hey," Dean started, but had to stop. He pressed his face into Cas's neck for a moment, took a deep breath, let it out, took another. "Hey," he tried again. "You know I— that this is serious, right?" Crap, how to say it when he couldn't say it, when his stupid throat closed up around the words he knew he should say and his stupid body was on the verge of a panic attack just thinking about it? He squeezed his hands on Cas's waist. "This is important. You know that, right? You're important." 

He looked up in a fit of wild desperation, searching Cas's eyes and face to see if his point got across. 

Cas was frowning slightly, puzzled by the human (he categorized Cas's frowns like he did Sam's bitchfaces). Cas reached up and stroked a soothing hand along Dean's hair. When he spoke, Cas's voice was quiet and calm. "I know you still long for me even when I'm in the room with you." 

Dean huffed something like a laugh, let his head drop back to Cas's shoulder. "Yeah, that sounds about right." 

Cas's hands on his were gentle and sure as he pushed Dean back, lifted his head, kissed him again. This time they kissed with more of a destination in mind. 

It turned out to be kind of a pain in the ass to remove shredded shirts but they managed. They ended up side by side on the bed, gradually getting more and more entangled. Cas finally pulled back enough to ask "What do you want?" 

Dean looked at him, wild hair, pupils blown wide and dark, mouth red and wet with kissing. _Don't overthink,_ he told himself, and said "I want you inside me." 

Cas's eyes went impossibly wider. "Are you sure?" he asked, staring into Dean's eyes with fierce intent. 

"Yes. Hell yes. _Fuck_ yes." 

Cas kissed him hard and fast and dirty, and then just flipped them until Dean was on his back, under Cas. Dean…Dean _really liked_ when Cas did that. 

Dean tried to put what he couldn't say into his kiss, into the way he touched Cas. 

He couldn't have put into words how it felt when Cas touched him, the reverence of his hands on Dean's chest, cradling his hips. They had left their boxers on, and Cas kissed along Dean's waist, just above the hem. 

Cas looked up for permission and Dean nodded. His heart was pounding as Cas carefully slid the boxers off. Cas sucked a bruise onto Dean's thigh while Dean squirmed beneath him, but when he tried to reach for Cas, Cas just pushed his hands down. It was difficult for Dean to just lay there— he felt like a slacker— but this also seemed like something Cas wanted, and Dean could give him that. 

Cas lowered his mouth around Dean's cock without further warning, and it was hot and wet and soft and Dean almost jackknifed off the bed. 

Cas glared at him, and Dean was definitely going to have a fetish for that glare and someday Cas would just smite him. "Hold still," Cas growled, and Dean was having a lot of ideas he might like to explore someday. 

But for now, he just wheezed "Sorry," and rolled his head back against the pillow. He fisted his hands in the comforter when Cas went down on him again. 

Either angels didn't have gag reflexes or could turn them off at will, because Cas just took him in and in and in. Dean choked on nothing, on air, on his own spit. And Dean was probably the one making those pathetic noises, too. He didn't particularly care right now. 

Cas and his amazing mouth were pulling Dean too close to the end, too fast. "Cas, come on," he finally gathered himself enough to speak. 

Cas looked at him, maintaining eye contact while pulling off Dean's cock slowly, and Dean almost came just from that. 

"You want something else now?" and angel powers or not, Cas's voice was even lower and more growly than before. Dean was going to die from this. 

"Yes, please, come on." 

"I don't…do you have—?" 

"Yes. Duffel bag. Front pocket." 

Cas got up to get the lube and Dean took a few seconds to try and compose himself. It was a lost cause, but he got his breathing a bit back under control, backed away from the edge of orgasm. 

Dean watched Cas slide back up the bed. He was trying not to be awkward but it was there underneath and Dean… Dean fucking adored him. "Come 'ere," he said, and pulled Cas close enough to kiss. 

Cas kissed him hard, then pulled back and asked "What do I do?" 

"Just use lots of lube." 

Dean had fingered himself a bit in the past so it wasn't a shock when Cas pushed a finger inside. "Like this?" he asked. 

"Yeah," Dean sighed, his eyes fluttering closed. "That's real good, Cas." 

Cas slowly eased in a second finger, and the burn was nice, especially when Cas proved he had no trouble finding Dean's prostate. Dean lost any semblance of being able to stay silent after that, moaning Cas's name. It almost felt like praying, and Cas had always been the only one he'd prayed to.

Cas moved up, enough to kiss Dean's chest and neck. "You're so beautiful," he whispered.

When Cas added a third finger Dean couldn't stay still anymore, and Cas didn't demand it again. He stretched Dean open with focused purpose now, and Dean ran his hands over Cas's shoulders, hair, whatever he could reach. 

"Cas, now, come on, please," Dean was openly begging and didn't care. "I'm ready. Come on." 

Cas kissed him again, just enough for Dean to start getting distracted, then pulled his fingers out. Dean whimpered. 

Cas had been doing research or something because he didn't have any trouble getting the condom on, which was good because Dean was in no position to assist him and definitely would've just said fuck it— it's not like he could catch anything. 

Cas pushed inside him slow but steady, without stopping, and Dean felt like he couldn't breathe at first. He pressed his face into Cas's neck and dug his fingers into his arms, and Cas went very still. 

It wasn't that it hurt, so much— the pain was on the right side of pleasure, anyway, but Dean wasn't used to feeling full and opened like this. But the real overwhelming part was the fucking _feelings_. Dean wasn't used to feeling so much, wasn't used to sex meaning anything and this meant so fucking much. It was just— a lot. 

He kept his face pressed to Cas's shoulder and took deep breaths. Cas and his fucking angelic patience kept perfectly still for a few moments, before he said "Dean?" 

"I'm okay," Dean said. "It's okay, just…move. Move now." 

Dean could feel Cas's doubt in the way he hesitated slightly longer, but then he trusted Dean, again, and slid back. The slow drag of his cock inside Dean felt so good he moaned, then realized he was still holding tightly to Cas's arms and forced his fingers to uncramp. 

"Sorry," he gasped. 

"It didn't hurt me," Cas said. It wasn't quite what Dean had been apologizing for but it didn't matter, because Cas was finally starting to fuck Dean in earnest and nothing else mattered. 

It was still a fucking lot to feel but the pleasure began overriding and wiping out everything else, and Dean could only hold on, running his hands over whatever parts of Cas he could reach. "I need you," he gasped, in time with Cas's thrusts, when he could get enough air. "I need you, I need you, I _need_ you…" 

Cas was staring at him because of course he was, and Dean forced himself not to look away. There were things Dean should say, things he wanted to say, but he still couldn't, so he wrapped his fingers in Cas's hair and pulled him down for a messy, breathy kiss instead. 

"Dean," Cas breathed, and he said more things with that one word than Dean would be capable of with a thousand. 

Cas was so good at hitting Dean's prostate that Dean had pretty much forgotten about his dick, but he now realized it was rubbing against Cas's stomach and that was almost but not quite enough. 

He reached down to wrap a hand around himself but Cas, supporting himself one-handed, brushed Dean's hand away. He wrapped his hand around Dean's cock instead. It only took two or three strokes before an orgasm took Dean by surprise and he was coming with a loud shout. 

It was amazing, clenching down around Cas's cock when he came, and yeah, they were definitely doing this again as soon as possible.

Dean was a limp puddle for Cas to rearrange as he liked, and Cas fucked him just a few more strokes, eyes wild, before he came inside Dean.

"Oh," Cas breathed, sounding more than a little shocked as he slumped next to Dean. 

Dean huffed a laugh. "Yeah, buddy, I know the feeling." 

"Was that…okay?" Cas asked. 

Dean laughed again. "It really, really was better than okay, Cas." 

"Oh good." Cas sounded vaguely drunk, and it must be exhaustion and afterglow. He lifted his hand, and Dean sensed incoming mojo use. 

"Hey, stop that." It was Dean's turn to knock Cas's hand down. "You're supposed to be healing."

"I feel extremely well." 

"Ha ha, asshole," Dean grinned. Cas grinned back. "That's not what I meant. Stay there." He rolled Cas onto his back and then got distracted by Cas's mouth, and kissing it. 

When he pulled back Dean took a careful look at Cas's chest, and pressed a soft kiss between two of the welts. They didn't look bad— well, not compared to how they'd looked earlier. 

Dean dragged himself up to go get cleaned up and brought a washcloth back for Cas. Cas had got rid of the condom while Dean was in the bathroom, and Dean looked around suspiciously but decided he'd rather not ask. 

He cleaned Cas off carefully. Cas wouldn't let him get up again afterward, just pulled Dean down to lay next to him. Dean didn't exactly put up a fight, but he did make Cas get under the covers with him. He was secretly excited about actually getting to sleep with Cas, as in fall asleep and wake up again. Dean didn't even pretend he wasn't into cuddling. Cas would see right through him, anyway. 

Their breathing slowly fell into sync, and this, right here, was already more than Dean had ever thought he'd have. 

\- - - 

\---

Dean was in such a good mood the next morning he knew it was obvious, and picked about three stupid fights with Sammy for fun. 

"Because that's just not how the internet works, Dean!" 

"Fiiiine," he drawled, as they were finishing breakfast. "We'll ask mom. Mom, who's your favorite son?" 

Sam sputtered. "What? That's not even—" 

"Castiel," she said, without missing a beat or even looking up. 

Cas radiated visible smugness from behind his newspaper. 

"Aw, come on," Sam said. 

"You both suck," Dean said. 

Mary sniggered at her plate and Cas rattled his newspaper and Dean didn't know what to do with all this. 

\---

"Come home," he whispered into Cas's mouth. They were hidden around the back of Cas's truck while Sam and Mary did whatever they were still doing inside. "Follow us home." 

Cas cupped his hands around Dean's face, rubbed the tips of their noses together. "I will, beloved," he said. 

That deserved a kiss, definitely, so Dean gave it to him, and then carefully straightened Cas's clothes, just as Sam and Mary came out into the parking lot. Dean did want to tell Sam, absolutely, just…not yet. As for Mary…that was trickier. She wasn't from here, after all, and there was only so much rejection Dean could cope with.

\---

\---

They went in caravan to the museum, ready to roll out directly after. 

"Sorry about the scorch mark in the floor upstairs," Mary said. 

"There was a monster in our fake hyena," Amina said. She'd said it three times now. 

"That is literally the weirdest sentence I've ever heard," Marion said. 

"I hope there hasn't been too much damage to the exhibits," Sam said. 

Amina gave them a disbelieving look— which was fair, Dean thought, because the room they'd been fighting in looked even worse in daylight. 

"Well," Amina sighed. "As long as it's definitely gone?" 

"Yes," Dean said firmly. "And we'll give your our numbers in case anything else happens, but this thing is gone." Probably. 

"How do you get involved in something like this?" Marion asked as they walked out to their cars. "I mean, how did you all end up… hunting monsters?" 

"It's, uh, the family business," Dean said. 

"So you're all related?" she asked. They were walking a little way behind the others. 

"Sam's my brother, Mary's our sister," he still hesitated a fraction before saying that, but Dean was a very good liar and didn't think a virtual stranger would notice. "And Cas is…" 

Cas picked that moment to look back at them. He asked a question with the tiniest of facial movements, and Dean answered with a tiny shake of his head. 

"Uh huh," Marion said. "I think I get it." 

Dean's knee-jerk reaction was still deny, deny, deny, but then he considered. He wasn't going to see her again, and he could tell from her tone she wasn't going to be weird about it. 

"Yeah," he said over the ringing in his ears, and it was surprisingly exhilarating. "Yeah, Cas and I are…yeah." 

She nodded. "Is it weird, working with your family so much?" 

That was it, that was her entire reaction, because of course Marion had no idea this was the first time he'd said it outloud. 

"It's just what you're used to, I guess." 

Cas was now on his phone and frowning. Dean didn't like that. He excused himself and hurried up to him. "What is it?" 

Cas was slouching and not meeting Dean's eyes, and Dean had a pretty good idea of what Cas was about to say. "There is a lead on Kelly Kline. Someone claims to have seen her." 

Dean swallowed down his disappointment. "Duty calls." 

"Dean, I'm sorry—" Cas sounded miserable. 

"Hey, no, it's okay." Dean put a hand on Cas's shoulder until Cas looked up at him. "I get it," he squeezed Cas's shoulder to emphasize his point. 

Cas nodded. "I'll return as soon as I can." 

"Yeah," Dean swallowed. He did understand, and he would've done the same thing, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to worry. "Keep in touch, okay?" 

Cas rolled his eyes, and Dean smiled. He couldn't help himself.

He watched Cas say goodbye to Sam and Mary, then slowly walked to join them. "What about you, mom?" Sam was asking. 

Mary darted nervous glances at Sam and Dean. "I've got a lead on something else," she said. 

"What kinda thing?" Dean asked. 

"I don't know yet," Mary said. "Could be nothing. I'll let you know." 

It popped into Dean's head that she was lying, but he shook the thought away. She just needed an excuse to not go with them. The thought still hurt, but not as much as it once did. 

"Right, well…" Dean trailed off. 

"Call us if you need us," Sam said, and went in for a hug. 

"I will, of course," Mary said. 

She let Sam go and looked at Dean, nervously. Dean stepped up and opened his arms, and she hugged him tightly. "Good work, boys. Take care of yourselves." 

She got in her car— where the hell had she got that cherry thing, anyway?— and was the first to leave. Amina and Marion waved goodbye, and then went back inside. The snow wasn't deep, but it was too cold out to linger much. 

Dean got in the Impala and made himself busy as Cas drove away too. Dean did not watch. 

Just him and Sam now, and Dean started to say something to that effect but when he looked over at Sam, Sam was giving him a sharp, assessing look. Ah, shit. 

"What is it?" Dean started the car, put her into drive. 

"What's going on with you and Cas?" Sam asked. Dean's palms started sweating. 

"What are you talking about?"

"I mean you were acting like you'd had a fight—"

"We didn't have a fight." 

"You were moping around the Bunker doing angry baking, that's what you get like when you fight with Cas." 

"I was not. And I do not." Dean reached for the radio, but Sam kept talking. 

"And then you were weird about seeing him, but you didn't seem pissed…" 

"Because I wasn't. Nothing's going on. Was going on, I mean. Nothing was going on. Nothing happened." 

"Dude," Sam said. 

Dean put the pedal to the metal and pulled out, a bit sharply so Sam jerked around. "Dean! You didn't even check—" 

"Yes, I did, now shut up." 

But Dean didn't turn up the music to eardrum-tearing levels. He could tell him, he thought. His hands were clenched tightly on Baby's steering wheel so he didn't know if they were shaking.

"Seriously, Dean," Sam said, in his no-seriously-it's-sharing-and-caring-time tone. 

Dean couldn't do it. 

"Fine," Sam huffed. "So you didn't fight. What did you do, finally grow a pair and tell him how you feel?" 

Dean was silent. He was horrified Sam had dared say that, that he could have _guessed,_ horrified he couldn't say anything else, and the horrible, horrible silence just continued. Way, way, too long. 

"…Holy shit," Sam said. 

Dean couldn't look at him. 

"Wait—really? Holy shit. What happened? Holy _shit._ "

Sam sounded…kind of impressed, actually, and Dean chanced a look over. He was gaping at Dean, and possibly bouncing in his seat a little. 

"Dean!" Sam shouted. "Don't leave me hanging, man! What happened?" 

"Well, I kicked you out of the fucking room last night, didn't I? You really want details?" 

"Holy SHIT," Sam said. 

Dean glanced at him again. Then again. Then again. "What the—? Sam, come on. Are you— are you _crying?_ " 

"No," Sam sniffed. "I'm just—I'm really happy for you, okay? I… I just really want you both to be happy, you know, and…" 

"Oh my god, stop talking. Right now. Forever. You're not supposed to cry when other people have sex. What is wrong with you? Christ. I am embarrassed for both of us." 

This time Dean did crank the music, and let "Whole Lotta Love" carry them off.


End file.
